Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, October 16, 1993                   TAG: 9310160064
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: A6   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: SANDRA BROWN KELLY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

PRESCRIPTION CENTER'S LINES RING WITH ITS FIRST ORDERS

Friday's calls were diverted from a Richmond center, one of the nine RPS facilities that take telephone orders and one of the company's 11 fulfillment centers.

Eventually, all orders will be taken in Roanoke at the center that was born from the demise of the Sears, Roebuck and Co.'s catalog business.

RPS is an affiliate of the American Association of Retired Persons and has its headquarters in Alexandria. In September it bought the Sears Telecatalog Center on Thirlane Drive and also rehired the Sears operation's managers and many of its former telemarketers in the deal.

Tom McVaney, manager for Retired Persons Services and former manager for the Sears operation, said several hundred former Sears workers will return as RPS employees.

The 700 part-time people who were laid off when the Sears Telecatalog Center closed in August have first option on the new jobs. McVaney expects employment to reach 800 by the end of November. The company expects to pay $5.25 to $6.70 an hour, depending on hours that employees work.

McVaney said the volume of calls will be increased as workers become familiar with the order procedure and the computer equipment.

The mail-order drug company filled 8 million prescriptions last year. Mail-order prescription sales, still considered in its infancy, is a $2 billion-a-year business. First Union Corp. owns the Thirlane building near Roanoke Regional Airport.

The company announced in August that it would take over the Roanoke operation, adding it to its 11 pharmacies. Nine take telephone orders.